“Cavalry, when used well, could serve as a force multiplier in battle. However this mostly applied to battles in the open plains where they had room to maneuver freely. In situations like sieges, or battles within close confines, cavalrymen can often find themselves without room for maneuvering on their mounts, and thus were often downgraded to infantry that used their mount’s mobility to get there sooner.

Naturally, there were cases where cavalry had managed to fight well in close confines, but those were usually cavalry like those of the goblins, which used smaller mounts like wolves and large felines that maneuvered with great grace and agility, or those of the dwarves which often had enough power to simply ram through buildings on their way. These were more often than not the exception to the norm, however.” - Excerpt from “The Vagaries of Warfare” by Maxim Stavros Odenlos, Military Scholar from the Clangeddin Empire, circa 443 VA.

The battle at Fort Kazka began a couple hours after dawn, as the army from the coalition of Central duchies marched out of their encampment and formed a solid formation roughly a quarter of the way between the encampment and the fort, well outside of the defenders’ arrow range, which left them unable to reply to the bombardment from the siege engines that kept going without pause.

So many stones had been hurled that they had begun to pile up by the foot of the fort’s walls, combined with the rubble from the pieces of masonry knocked loose off those very same walls. The venerable fort looked notably the worse for wear after what must have been weeks of bombardment. Parts of its walls were close to collapse, and many of the soldiers that manned those walls carried injuries on their bodies.

Below, gates from the sides of the fort and parts of the earthen ramparts next to it opened as forces from both Fort Kazka and their reinforcements sallied out. They had little choice in the manner, as unless they could disable their opponent’s siege engines, their armies would just be sitting ducks for the picking as they could not retaliate at all.

The soldiers that sallied were notably outnumbered, maybe only twelve thousand in all, whereas from the news the young Duchess received there should have been around double that in total after a second wave of reinforcements from Algenverr and the main city of Jonkver itself. It spoke a lot of the heavy casualties they must have taken in the battles so far.

On the Central side, around twenty thousand or so soldiers were arrayed in formation, and there were likely some more within their encampment to guard and man the siege engines. To sally into battle was little more than a forlorn hope for the defenders, but it was probably the only choice they had other than to wait for their defenses to be breached.

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Both sides yelled and charged, as the armies clashed roughly halfway between the fort and the Central army’s encampment. The difference between the two sides were instantly made clear, however, as while the defenders attacked with ferocity and obvious urgency, the Central forces were content to allow them to break themselves upon their solid defenses, seemingly in no hurry whatsoever.

The young Duchess allowed the battle to carry on for a good hour first, to make sure that the Centrals were well and truly occupied by their opposition. Only then did she give the signal for the assault to commence.

Roughly three quarters of the forces that came from the south revealed themselves as they circled from behind the hill at that point, roughly a kilometer to the southern flank of the battle. The forces, which were comprised of over half of the Free Lances, the entirety of the Janissaries, most of the forces from Dvergarder that went north, as well as the detachment from Fort Kuzi, made their presence known as they charged towards the battlefield, straight at the flank of the Central army.

The Centrals were clearly surprised at the unexpected development, but quickly shifted part of their formation to face the new foe, even as the invigorated defenders from Algenverr and Jonkver redoubled their assault, their morale soaring at the sight of allied reinforcements.

Just as the forces from the south approached arrow range however, the situation changed once more, as the cavalry detachment led by the young Duchess herself charged over the hill and straight towards the Central army’s encampment, along with a select group of Reinhardt’s elites, the ones who were able to keep a pace that matched a horse for a short while either on their own or while carrying someone on their backs, and the fighters deemed good enough to carry on their backs.

Behind them another thousand or so of Dvergarder’s elite infantrymen followed as they ran as fast as their legs could take them. Even so they couldn’t help but lag behind and were not even halfway to the encampment when the cavalry had reached there.

Reinhardt and his elites led the charge, and the therians amongst them fluidly shifted from running on all fours to standing up even as those on their backs leapt down as they reached the anti-cavalry barricades set around the encampment, mostly in the form of a row of stakes pointed outward at a diagonal angle.

Mischka and her group instantly went to work and either crushed or uprooted the barricades on their way, while the rest of the Free Lances split up to their sides as they covered them and fought off the encamptment’s defenders who came to face them.

Grünhildr led the group on the left while Reinhardt himself dealt with the right side, and moments later, the cavalry led by the young Duchess arrived. The inside of the encampment was too crowded and the Centrals had built more barricades within, which made cavalry raids an unviable proposition to undertake, but the young Duchess had long readied herself for that as well.

With an agile leap, she dismounted from her steed, as did the rest of her knights, as they left a couple junior knights to guard their horses while the rest of them grouped up with the Free Lances. Together, they broke into the encampment and began to wreak havoc within.

Knights were trained to fight on foot as well, after all.